ENHANCING CHEMO by Harry Chrissakis, Herbalist, M.H.Natural Healing
HERBALIST AND HERBS
It seems natural that this article would follow REDUCING SIDE EFFECT. Part of reducing side effect (and also increasing desired effect) is in reducing multi-drug resistance and finding out if the person can actually metabolize and excrete the drug and in finding out what the cancer is standing on, in terms of support. A better result would be gained if we first tested a much wider variety of parameters to see if this particular patient is suited to the drug in question. Once again there is a lot out there in terms of diagnostic technology that is not being used. Many are simple front line tests and a number are labs that specialize in a particular area.
Cancer is neither mysterious or illogical and yet we treat it that way. How do you prove that it is not mysterious and that it must follow laws? Cancer is opportunistic and predatory. It has a strategy that is both general and also specific to that person i.e. cancer is trying to gain complete independence from the bodies normal control mechanisms and it is doing it relative to that particular person’s physiology and that person’s specific cancer patho-physiology. This is an important point, to study the person and the cancer independently and by putting both those pieces of information together to come up with a much clearer picture in order to produce more efficient chemo protocols. Cancer is a separate life form struggling for complete autonomy. Whatever opportunity it is given, it will capitalize on. That translates into a lot more details than we are ascertaining before a drug is administered and more responsibility in the patient’s lap in areas such as diet. Much more homework is necessary and that is both time consuming and somewhat tedious for both therapist and patient. Problem is that right now there is no other way and cancer is not waiting.
Now let’s watch a short video:
I am going to move on to some concrete examples of the combination of expanded diagnostic testing and the results it can give, in terms of information value. Let’s take breast cancer as an example. Pathology report may read as follows; A woman 52 years old; 1 inch tumor left breast; invasive ductal carcinoma; estrogen and progesterone positive ; Low s-phase or K I 67 below 10% ; diploid ; stage 2; her 2 positive
PROTOCOL – Surgery( lumpectomy), chemo and or radiation
This profile is an extremely common profile and so is the general form of the protocol (70% of newly diagnosed breast cancer is invasive ductal carcinoma and that is 70% of the 200,000 cases of breast cancer diagnosed each year in the U.S.)
What could be done differently?
SURGERY (lumpectomy)
Post surgically send a fresh tumor sample to Weissenthal Labs or Rational Theraputics. This one simple procedure would in and of itself constitute a major step forward. If this were done as standard procedure, a lot of the guessing, as to which chemo drug to even consider, would be eliminated. What these labs do is test a range of chemo agents against the live cancer cells in the tumor sample and determine which of the chemo drugs is going to be effective against that cancer.
GENOMIC TESTING (Onco DX , Mamaprint )
From these genomic tests it can be determined who is at risk for recurrence. These facts could have a major influence on protocol.
SNP Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (Genova Labs).
These are functional genetic mutations that can have a large impact on how a drug is utilized, metabolized and eliminated. SNP’s are classed as such when they affect more than 1% of the measured population. As an example, I will take the SNP MTHFR. This SNP shows that this person has a problem utilizing folic acid (folic acid is needed for a number of critical things in our body). Methotrexate (a chemo drug classed as an antimetabolite) is a folate inhibitor, the intention of which is to stop the cancer cells rapid division and damage the cancer cell (folate is intrinsic to proper cell division and is needed by the cancer cells for the same thing). This is a great idea, but if this person has this relatively common SNP (estimates are that 10% of the population have it) this drug will hurt them and not help at all. As an aside, people that have elevated homocysteine in their blood stream often have this SNP. Elevated homocysteine is a risk factor for heart disease and osteoporosis.
FRONT LINE TESTS
CBC, METABOLIC, LIPID, INSULIN, HbA1C, D-DIMER, FIBRINOGEN, HOMOCYSTIENE, C-REACTIVE PROTEIN.
Many of the more common labs perform these tests ( Labcorp, Quest )
The first three tests are often given, but not repeated often enough (testing and setting base line and then re-testing and comparing, can validate or deny the efficacy of the protocols). The rest, which are of equal importance, are often not done at all. A big problem in chemo is developing clots, which can kill a patient. Those extra tests can help to determine who is at risk to develop a clot from the chemo. Testing (setting base line) and then re-testing, can validate or deny the efficacy of the protocols. Part of cancer’s strategy is also to thicken blood, giving it more growth factors and a favorable environment in which to grow collateral veinous structures (angiogenesis) in order to get more glucose and oxygen into the cancer cell. Cancer patients with insulin resistance or diabetes (very common) who are inclined to clotting because of the nature of this pre existing disorder are at even greater risk. We are not connecting these dots well in contemporary chemo oncology.
TUMOR ANALYSIS: MOLECULAR PROFILING: BIOMARKER ANALYSIS: ( Target Now, Response Genetics )
These tests can determine which growth factors are active, if receptors are amplified and genetic mutations of this particular cancer in this particular person. This information can reveal the supportive mechanisms the cancer is using to resist the drugs. Again this can have major impact on determining protocol.
These tests and the type of information they yield are critical in the area of which drug goes to who. Without this type of work as part of diagnostic evaluation a lot has to be done in the dark. What I have laid out is an abridged version of the type of investigative work that could be done and what I believe is part of the path to a much better result with chemo.
Harry Chrissakis
www.Herbalistandherbs.com /> contact@herbalist-herbs.com 530-933-8244